Coding facial expressions with Gabor wavelets

A method for extracting information about facial expressions from images is presented. Facial expression images are coded using a multi-orientation, multi-resolution set of Gabor filters which are topographically ordered and aligned approximately with the face. The similarity space derived from this representation is compared with one derived from semantic ratings of the images by human observers. The results show that it is possible to construct a facial expression classifier with Gabor coding of the facial images as the input stage. The Gabor representation shows a significant degree of psychological plausibility, a design feature which may be important for human-computer interfaces. n.b. Facial images in this document are subject to specific terms of use and may not be reused without permission, regardless of the license applied to the document as a whole.A database of facial expressions collected for the research accompanies the article and is available for use by other researchers. JAFFE facial expression image database: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.345152